Sunday, December 12, 2010

Dave Cole, "The Money Dress," (Detail of dollar bill fabric), approximately one-thousand one dollar bills cut into continuous strips and knit together in the pattern of a Vera Wang evening gown, 2006.

SLOW FASHION MEET SLOW MONEY.

Slow Money Principles include:

I. We must bring money back down to earth.

II. There is such a thing as money that is too fast, companies that are too big, finance that is too complex. Therefore, we must slow our money down -- not all of it, of course, but enough to matter.

III. The 20th Century was the era of Buy Low/Sell High and Wealth Now/Philanthropy Later—what one venture capitalist called “the largest legal accumulation of wealth in history.” The 21st Century will be the era of nurture capital, built around principles of carrying capacity, care of the commons, sense of place and non-violence.

IV. We must learn to invest as if food, farms and fertility mattered. We must connect investors to the places where they live, creating vital relationships and new sources of capital for small food (or may I suggest small fashion) enterprises.

V. Let us celebrate the new generation of entrepreneurs, consumers and investors who are showing the way from Making A Killing to Making a Living. (amen.)

VI. Paul Newman said, "I just happen to think that in life we need to be a little like the farmer who puts back into the soil what he takes out." Recognizing the wisdom of these words, let us begin rebuilding our economy from the ground up, asking:

* What would the world be like if we invested 50% of our assets within 50 miles of where we live?* What if there were a new generation of companies that gave away 50% of their profits? (or what if they didn't have to b/c companies served legitimate human needs without exploiting humans and at an expensive to the earth.)* What if there were 50% more organic matter in our soil 50 years from now?